A couple of weeks ago, Austria’s 4betUr3betcame away with a three-way chop in the PokerStars Sunday Warm-Up. He officially took third place for $77,000 after striking a deal with TTycho and Casey bigdogpckt5s Jarzabek, the latter of whom took down the Sunday Major that day for $83,000. It was the Austrian’s largest tracked cash to date and the largest score of his career. Accordingly, we caught up with him to discuss his country’s latest claim to fame.

The October 23rd edition of the PokerStars Sunday Warm-Up drew a competitive field of 3,395 players and the top 495 landed in the money. The $500,000 guaranteed prize pool was crushed in the process, as the purse nearly topped $700,000. The $215 buy-in event runs exclusively on PokerStars every Sunday.

The tournament didn’t start off so smoothly for 4betUr3bet, who told PocketFives, “I was not getting the right spots to chip up from the beginning, so I waited some time for my first double up.” Once play reached the 250-500 level, 4betUr3bet’s stack grew rapidly from 20,000 to 100,000, starting with drawing out on A-K with K-Q after the money went in on a king-high board with one card to come. A queen hit on the river and 4betUr3bet doubled up to stay alive. In a span of just 30 hands, he quintupled his chip stack.

During the next few orbits, the PokerStars RNG dealt him dandies like pocket queens, pocket kings, and pocket aces, which held up every time his stack was at risk. He entered the final table of the Sunday Warm-Up sixth in chips and explained, “I was not that active at finale two tables because it was so shallow. It was just difficult to find the right spots. I coolered the guy I later busted with A-A against A-K on the final two tables. That was the double up that secured the final table for me.”

He’s currently sixth in the PocketFives Sortable Poker Rankingsfor Austria, a leaderboard that also includes the likes of IM_ICMand schappuscha (pictured). 4betUr3bet painted a picture of the poker scene in his home country: “Poker is very popular here. We have a lot of poker clubs and casinos just for poker. There are really good players both live and online here in Austria. With the poker boom, a lot of people got to know poker a little better and I think everyone who is in any sense familiar with that game knows that there is some skill involved.”

Other scores for the Sunday Major final tablist include a second place finish in the PokerStars Bigger $162 in late August for $27,000 and a win in a MiniFTOPStournament in May for nearly $21,000. He has 851 tracked cashes on PocketFives and is averaging about $500 apiece. You can find him at #157 worldwide, down 12 spots from his peak position of #145 in the PocketFives Rankings.

We asked 4BetUr3bet how an Austrian like himself got into poker: “During my studies, I got into the game due to my friends and through it appearing on TV. From the first moment, I was fascinated at the competition. I soon realized that there is some deep thinking involved and I guess that’s a big strength of mine.”

Here’s a look at the final table of the October 23rd running of the PokerStars Sunday Warm-Up, reflecting the three-way deal:

1. bigdogpckt5s $83,000.00 (bigdogpckt5s)
2. TTycho $82,063.00
3. 4betUr3bet $77,000.00 (4betUr3bet)
4. aleksandr274 $39,042.50
5. Mr. OPW $28,857.50
6. FRAMEKINGS $22,067.50
7. wulko333 $15,277.50
8. punkrott $8,487.50
9. BeSje $5,432.00

Congratulations to 4betUr3bet for chopping the Warm-Up. Stay tuned to PocketFives for the latest MTT coverage from throughout the online poker community. Visit PokerStars for more details.